


To a Happier Year

by mybabybangbang



Category: Maurice (1987), Maurice - E. M. Forster
Genre: Declarations Of Love, First Love, Love at First Sight, M/M, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon, Young Love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-24
Updated: 2020-12-03
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:54:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27693064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mybabybangbang/pseuds/mybabybangbang
Summary: Before Maurice, there was Quinn.Clive and his friends spend time in their teenager years when he meets Quinn Frasier, a boy one year older than him who seems to be braver at everything sixteen years old Clive doesn't dare to do.
Relationships: Clive Durham/Original Character
Comments: 1
Kudos: 10





	1. Chapter 1

Clive's eyes fall into the stranger. One heartbeat followed by another, pause. He wonders whether it is his or just a quake of anxiety hitting his flesh.

Before him a whole orchestra of beautiful, blessed emotions that are just born. Inside of his ribs. Discomposing his head. His heart just became conscious of its existence and so burns with emotion at the discovery of such lovely sensitivity.

He is incapable of turning his gaze away from the solitary young boy, a newcomer to the area, seated quietly beneath a tree with its shadow bathing his shoulders as he puffs a smuggled cigarette. He seems like a picture. It seems like a picture: he can see all his tones and layers. The excess. A little blue here. A little yellow over his frown. Faint red over his cheeks before being covered by a much more proper orange. The stranger listens to the other boys’ conversation; he just joined the circle. Below his uncombed light-brown locks of hair are his meek, yet daring hazel eyes, caught within a floating gloom of bluish smoke around his ruddy features.

And then he surprises him. The stranger stares at him in return and Clive's face finds nowhere to hide.

When said lad rises from his rest, throws away his cigarette in a careless manner before approaching another young boy from Clive’s circle at the very moment it is his chance to speak; he shakes his hand and draws his mouth close to his ear, breathes a whisper and soon the just-defined-middleman is introducing Clive to the tawny-haired boy, and the victim, evidently displeased at being cut off from the conversation with the other lads, babbles away something of the sort:

"Um, Durham...", he goes on to suggest the young man next to him in subtle gestures. "Quinn Frasier─… stepson of my aunt─… has just moved in─… very smart fellow─… be polite to him."

And that's when that Quinn boy speaks up, takes a step forward and aims to shake Clive's hand. It is his tactfulness that causes Clive to squirm, though he tries to grant him one of his best smiles. Two boys find themselves in the other’s reflection, not knowing who is who, which side is theirs; they just know they are carved the same.


	2. Chapter 2

The usual. Clive’s friend circle is lounging around freely.

There’s nothing else to do than to waste their youth.

On hot days like these, in Pendersleigh there is no greater pleasure to be found in life than to lie next to the river, to be covered by shadows whose silhouette is outlined by the rays of sunlight pouring through the foliage of the trees. Clive is on his knees alongside one of his friends, both engaged with gathering up pebbles close to the water, to compare them; although Clive’s gaze gives Quinn a furtive glimpse from time to time.

He collects a good number of pebbles. But when he thinks it is enough, Quinn pierces in his consciousness once again. His voice. His presence. Then Clive gathers more pebbles, places them in his hand, and expect their texture to be enough distraction. To soothe whatever may be happening to him.

“Hear about what? I hear many things all the time, you'll have to be more specific”, as Quinn’s voice finds his ears, Clive’s face breaks into a smile; mechanical. It happens every time. The smile breaks till his face hurts before it hurt somewhere else. 

In those instances, perhaps an exquisitely ineffable joy flows through his body and the sole reason is that Quinn has managed to blend in beautifully with his group. And Clive is just happy for him. Is happy to have things in common. To see the connections, the space between them─ the way he can find Quinn in everywhere he went, anywhere he stared at. A tenderness, a need to take care of him and celebrate his successes is a gentle taste that has been in Clive's mouth since he met him. And he longs to know him and wants to hold him and be his friend.

“Mr Lloyd’s wife died. She did last night”, the younger one in their circle, clumsy little Crawford. “I heard my big brother say that Mr Lloyd infected her with sy… Syphae...”

“Syphilis?”, Crawford nods. “Why, that’s a horrible thing to say!”

"Well, tell you what, it's not as terrible as what happened to Mr Lloyd."

"Don’t need to know.”

"He went to prison, a number of years before that, for the reason he contracted syphilis.", the boy smiles when others' laughter bursts after his comment. "I suppose you realize what that means."

"Could not care less, really."

It comes to Clive’s understanding that everyone wants Quinn’s validation. To some extent, he does too, apart from him being shyer, more sensitive when it comes to him. Clive can’t help thinking that he, himself, is so different. He never finds the courage to talk to him. Although he had at first laughed at Crawford’s remarks, the slightest thought of him being different from the others, having some sort of sickness… It suffocates him till his smile fades. He returns to the peddles.

But then, emerging auroral behind of him, Quinn's voice reaches Clive once again and the light goes back to his semblance; he turns and finds him leaning against a tree as he talks, and Clive’s face softens. How could such a beautiful gift be wrong?

"Actually, I think you and your big brother are very ordinary and it makes me feel sick to listen to your gossip”, he then lights a cigarette ─at which point it is somewhat of a thing that Clive is used to seeing him do─ and places it between his lips, tilting it as he speaks. “Besides, it's distasteful to talk about dead people. If she hears you, little Crawford, you'll have old Mrs Lloyd pulling your toes in your sleep.”

Clive joins in the roaring laughter of the whole group, yet not taking his eyes off of Quinn. But as soon as the cigarette smoke dissipates, Clive is speechless when he realizes that Quinn has been staring at him too. For a moment he is left without a voice to share in the common laughter.

“Durham, make me company. I can’t tolerate them.”

“Durham doesn’t even know how to talk,” a boy complains, to which Quinn quickly answers:

“The very reason why I like him! Someone who can behave,” before continuing, oblivious to the silent his slight disgust has fashioned, he gets closer to Clive. The easiness with which his steps come to Clive, the light wave of his hand holding his cigarette, the face… The healthy, ruddy features of someone who mind no one’s rejection, for he never faced any. “Sick of boys who only seem to talk to see how loud they can sound. Hate them.”

Clive is amazed by the view: everyone holding their breath at the expectation of Quinn’s conclusion, glazing with green looks at Clive, the object of all Quinn’s attentions. And he feels privileged. He is the favourite, after all.

It is almost a surprise when Quinn reaches a hand makes Clive’s pebbles his property before throwing them all to the extension of the river. A few drops of water meet Clive, who is still speechless at the ghost left on his skin by Quinn’s touch.

“All of you should be following Durham. He is the older kid─ before me, obviously. I’ll be lucky if I ever get to be like him, however,” and then he turns to Clive. His voice hits him like breath. “Then, make me company. I want to smoke with someone decent.”

Clive notices his petition is rather an order. It almost makes him smile─ but he is still as a statue. As the perception Quinn has of him. He can only mumble an unfinished ‘sure’.

“My mother met her. Mrs Lloyd,” Clive says.

“Hum?” Quinn frowns in confusion, unable to talk because of the cigarette still between his lips. Hum meaning What are you talking about.

“You know, the lady Crawford was talking about.”

“Ah, well─ fuck!” it meaning, the cigarette has fallen to the dirt as he attempted to talk.

“I’m sorry─ I mean, I should have been quiet. You said you─ sorry,” he struggles to say. Quinn looking everywhere in his pants for more cigarettes has Clive distracted: it both amuses him and makes him feel guilty.


	3. Chapter 3

“Durham,” Quinn stretches a hand to Clive’s; it is a wandering one, from someone who never thought he would get beaten by a few old books. “I don’t understand anything you’re saying to me!”

“I thought you liked Greek,” he replies, turning his sight from the book in front of him. It is Quinn’s touch the reason why he stops.

“Well, obviously I liked,” he confesses. “But I don’t see the use in it anymore. Why, when I can perfectly read translations?”

“Translations are not an option for me. Neither should they be for you. You lose too many things, too many touches. It feels like reading something artificial.”

“I stopped fighting grammar a long time ago, now I am just interested in modern languages. In real people, you see. I don’t care about touches but to understand whatever the story might tell me.”

“Just so. That’s the reason why you should stop reading translations.”

Quinn goes silent as he spreads out on the floor of Clive's room before letting out all kinds of lazy sounds, distracting Clive from his studies. Sitting next to him, in a proper position, Durham can’t but read back the same paragraph again and again.

Quinn, lying between mountains of Clive’s books and bathed by a portion of the light coming from the window, goes back to complaining.

“Why do you have this need to know everything? Isn’t just enough to be above the average?”

“Well, I am far from even being average.”

“Right. The average reads Greek faster.”

Clive doesn’t seem to taste the sarcasm in the other’s words. Instead, he blushes and buries with more shame his expression between the pages of his book.

“I enjoy greater pleasures,” Quinn goes on. “Because I don’t feel intellectually in debt with the world, I just live my life as it should be lived.”

“I’m not intellectually in debt.”

And silence spreads. Durham is too occupied with tangled words and infinite ways to interpret a certain text when he feels Quinn’s hand just above his, his warmness stroking his cold skin. For once he seems truly undone, even if his eyes won’t drift from the characters in his book and his body refuses to acknowledge the intimacy of another.

“Silly, you are looking for sensation,” Quinn finally speaks, slowly dragging his fingertips across the prominences in Clive’s hand. “I have no doubts you’re indeed exceptional, but you still lack sensitivity. You think you may get all the things you want by reading them on tortuously elaborate prose.”

“I don’t think you can find a friend in a book. Certainly, they may be described there, but they are still not yours,” finally, Quinn moves his fingers away from Clive’s hand. “Flesh, blood, warmth, someone who can be kissed and touched, and that is not in some Greek but in your own world you insist on ignoring. Tell you what, I think you are just shy. You may touch words if they’re enough for you, but you will only end up ruining the ink.”

How could he know, Clive tells himself. He would like to think so, that he is just shy─ the reason why he wastes his youth reading and looking up every word in the dictionary, and occasionally spending time as a mere lamb to the kids who visit him in the woods of Penge. But he is not.

“Ah, I see I have troubled you,” Quinn comments, after a while of staring at Clive. “Don’t pay any attention to me, I talk too much.”

Clive is strangely glad of seeing him putting on his jacket and slapping the dust off of his clothes. However, he had expected to spend more time with Quinn.

“You are leaving?”

“Yes! I am not doing you any good, I’m afraid.”

Clive ponders the thought for a while: in terms of disturbing, yes, Quinn had inserted himself into Clive’s routine. His study hours, his recreational time. In some way, Clive enables him to do so. He had questioned every aspect of his daily life, mocked all his books and awakened passions that Clive didn’t know before. He is not doing Clive any good at all. Not with his unpleasant opinions and disagreeable manners.

Yet Clive hesitates at letting him go. He gets up abruptly, stepping on his papers and ruining his book’s pages. Quinn takes notice, he turns to him just centimetres away from the exit door.

“Durham?”

“Please,” he mumbles under his breath. “Don’t think you have upset me by coming today. It is none of that, but the fact that you were right which disturbed me: I am too shy, I lack many things. You’re nothing but right.”

Quinn lets out a faint smile. “You don’t lack anything, Durham. You’re good.”

“You’re still leaving,” he observes in return.

“It is better if you study in silence. You should’ve listened to my father saying to me, too many of my influence will overflow you. You’d be ruined then, as the good chap you are. Don’t want that,” he replies. “But I still insist on doing so, you see. So, if you plan on visiting the real world today, you can meet me by the river; I may be there for a while.”

Clive smiles. “I may be there too.”


	4. Chapter 4

It shocks Clive to know that an entire month has passed since he met Quinn. In some way, that’s a lot. In some way, that’s so little.

Whenever he is with Quinn, time passes and when he is gone, Clive is as disenchanted as if it was a ten-seconds meeting. When he is there, it seems to Clive that the time couldn’t get any slower. It is always a sting in the heart to seeing his friend leave so unaffected, even though it is a pleasant pain the one that struck his chest too.

He wants his daring, his ability to leave whenever wanted, the poison with which he sweetens up his words and leaves lovely but aching marks on other people. By this stage, he doesn’t know whether he likes or whether he wants to be him, but the warm feeling burning inside of him can only be described as the desire of being two images, two souls, juxtaposed. That’s how he understands such complexity. 

Outside his knowing it is obvious, and his already white skin grows so pale whenever the thought stays even a second in his head, that everyone can see his infatuation. There’s no name for it, however, and it just passes as admiration. But it is there, can be seen and feel. Whatever name they decide it is still dangerous to let it slip.

“My mother once told me,” he comments distantly, but soon Clive finds himself to be surrounded by his rather occasional friends. Quinn’s hazel eyes find his, growing confused when Clive doesn’t finish his sentence. “… Matters that should be discussed privately,” and after saying that, he quickly drags Quinn with him behind a tree of considerable distance from the others.

“Told you what, you poor child?” says Quinn with an ironic grin. It manages to make Clive grow insecure.

However, even if his eyes drop and he hesitates between giving one step closer or one back, Clive still wants to know Why does everyone catalogue Quinn as dangerous. Despite everything else he knows is wrong but doesn’t find the courage to drain.

“My mother once told me,” he went back to his initial revelation, “I spend too much time with you.”

“Well, I agree.”

And there it is. His peacefully give up, the indifference to whether he is the subject of discussion or whether he is not: he couldn’t care less about his impact in the world, in society as a separated being and Clive himself.

“She only said that. Pretty odd, mind you, and I think everyone quietly agrees with her as well.”

“As they should!” and with a smile, Quinn attempts to dismiss the question. “Is that everything, then?”

“Yes,” Clive stutters, under his breath. “But I don’t understand. You care so little.”

“And you care so much. A jolly union, truly.”

Clive smiles, though displeased. “So you think she’s right.”

“Mrs Durham just made an observation.”

“And you think it is a negative aspect that we spend together so much time,” he adventurers.

“Oh, no!” in just a flash, Quinn lift his arm to Clive’s and places the tip of his fingers above the bare skin on his arm. The blonde layer of hair in Clive’s pearly skin rises like an ecstatic stick in reaction, immediately burning under someone else’s touch. “In fact, I think we should spend even more!”

Though a friendly action it is, Clive, once again, is struck by his intimacy. His easiness, the confidence of the boy capable of reaching and touching, though not of talking: or at least so appears to Clive, who never understand his meaning. Is he cruel? Is he friendly? It hurts, his faint, crooked smiles, his unnecessary opinions. But it also brings joy, the feel, the smell of ashes over his shoulders contrasting the sere aroma of his hair. That is a whole array of emotion, a complex one.

“I thought I was boring,” he replies, tickled. “I thought I lacked sensibility.”

“It’s true you do.”

“Then why would you want to spend time with me?”

“You’re always looking for reasons,” Quinn answers with hesitation after a while pondering a proper reaction. “Always! You can’t just take what is being given to you. Never.”

He walks away before Clive can elaborate an answer. It seems to him that he has pulled a string in Quinn, that he was the one touching, in a completely metaphorical space, this time. He notices a faint blush in the other’s face as well but quietly goes back with the union of boys next to the river.


End file.
